


I'd Do Anything To Make You Stay

by hummingrightalong



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Emotional Baggage, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Psychological Trauma, Rick's crazy eyes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-19
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-22 22:32:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17068403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hummingrightalong/pseuds/hummingrightalong
Summary: After Rick kills Joe, having one of his crazy moments, Daryl has to bring him back from the brink with a difficult conversation.





	I'd Do Anything To Make You Stay

**Author's Note:**

> Rating and warnings for Dixon's canon child abuse, and a bit more I've inferred.
> 
> Trigger warnings for references of child physical and sexual abuse.

Most of the time, Rick comes back. 

The man, the hero, the ordinary person that became a beacon of hope for their little hopeless group in the end of the word; sometimes, he lets go. Sometimes he loses his temper. Sometimes he loses his damn self. 

And because he’s a hero, because he’s an inspiration to most of the lives he touches, he comes back.

But last night someone did something unforgivable, or at least tried to. Someone became the straw that broke the camel’s back. Someone turned off the lights and broke the switch. 

Everyone there had seen those bright blue eyes go empty. Everyone had been there to see the daylight, the life, leave him. It was like he was hollow, and yet there was the father, the friend, the lover, and maybe a demon, that had a moment’s hesitation when he bit a chunk out of a man’s throat for threatening his own. The hesitation to let himself enjoy it. 

Rick’s eyes always made Daryl think of the break of day, a symbol of hope. The color was still there, but the man, the light, was gone. 

He sat there, covered in dried blood; zoned out, so far gone and maybe lost forever. 

He wouldn’t even accept an odd glance from his son, who’d barely been convinced even with his own eyes after the fact that his daddy hadn’t somehow turned. Wasn’t really gone. 

Maybe this was the night they lost him. Maybe he really had sacrificed himself to save his family.

Well that was just goddamn unacceptable.

There had to be a way to shake him out of it and the tracker could only think of one sure fire way to turn the lights back on. Give him something to protect.

He sits down next to him, inspects without touching. He’s not wounded, other than the usual cuts and bruises from the fight. But he’s not in there either. 

Somewhere Daryl had heard once that kissing someone broke them out of a panic attack. He knows where *he* has to go to do it, but he straddled the other man’s thighs, kisses him deeply, pressing their bodies together and giving a little gasp into Rick’s mouth, fingers tangled in his dirty hair. He responds instinctually, but a little hint of something comes to the surface. Because this isn’t Daryl, and Rick would know that.

“Ever wonder how I do that?” Daryl asks, voice low. So quiet he’s not even sure if he spoke. To Rick, the other man’s voice is both deafening and muffled at the same time, like he’s underwater, or how Shane sounded in the hospital...The next part of the plan sucks, and it hurts him maybe more than it’ll hurt Rick, but maybe they both need this right now. Truth be told, while he was trying to save his lover, he needed him back because last night brought up things he didn’t really want to rehash. Memories flooded, the beatings, the cruel words, and worse - he bites back bitter a bitter laugh...dear old daddy Dixon. Daryl doesn’t get people but he understands now with the help of horrified friends what is and is not an appropriate/inappropriate response/reaction/topic of casual conversation. 

Will hadn’t just been cruel. He’d been a lot of things. Judging by uncle Jesse and how he turned out, Will may have been a lot of things for *years*. And Daryl took after Jesse, physically anyway. He always thought he looked so different from Merle because they had had different mothers, until he met his uncle when he was a bit older himself, able to make the comparison; able to make the connection. 

The old man hadn’t just done it himself; if he were in debt, if he were just feeling mean, made some new friends...well, in Rick’s words when it starts to sink in-

“Your daddy...he turned you out?” Daryl /does/ laugh then. Almost regrets it when he sees Rick’s horrified expression but the lights back, he laughs and there are no regrets.

“When he had to. Hell, I dunno. When he felt like it I guess. Not sure if it was better or worse than when it was just the two of us.”

“It’s your daddy.” Daryl nods in response without saying anything. Because yeah, there’s nothing like that. Nothing like knowing your own parent doesn’t love you enough to protect you. Even worse if they’re the thing you need protection from. The scars on his back made him hesitate to take his shirt off in mixed company more out of impatience of explaining it so often; the hesitation he felt from a gentle touch was more complicated. 

It wasn’t that he was just ‘used to being hit’. He wasn’t used to anything. The only thing that made sense about his life (before Rick) was whatever he dictated. The way he chose to live alone, strange redneck Daryl in the woods, was a conscious choice. Because it was a choice. Everything out there- life and death- was up to him. he lived or died - *no*, he *survived* by his own hand.

The shit he learned from Will Dixon, and from the strangers he brought around, in the worst of times had come to his advantage. If he shut off that part of his mind that processed dealing with people socially, accepting himself after watching the way he acted, he’d used it to his advantage. When it was life or death. Death was the easy way out and not Daryl’s style.

“I know how to look, act, talk, *fuck* any way any one wants at any given time...I can seduce you while I roll a smoke. I know how to look up through my hair just right with that kicked puppy look that says, I had a rough night Daddy, rescue me - if I know the trick has the right white collar hero kink. Hadn't even seen pretty woman when I came up with that one...guess I've known my way around most things, most my life. I'm not good with people unless I turn my brain off. I don't do that with you. I can wipe that nasty shit off my hand or be pissed for the rest of the day because you forgot to warn me and scope is a commodity at the moment. Because you're Rick and I don't have to act like anyone but me.”

Rick shakes his head, and there it is. The light isn’t just back behind those pretty blues, daylight itself breaks. It bursts wide open and he leans back to take in the other man’s face. “Shit, I’m sorry. I’m here, I’m always going to be here. I just...I lost myself.”

“Well you can’t. Not like that. Not for good. I know sometimes a good man needs to do something- anything- to make the world a better place. But you’re my world, and them kids. Please...stay.”

“Promise I will.”

“Ok, good, now wash that damn shit off your face. You’re starting to get flies.”

After Rick is cleaned up and feeling sane enough to satisfy a disturbing curiosity, he can't help but ask, "white collar hero complex? Is that the hook you woulda used on me?""First of all, the word hook, probably not..." Rick chuckles in spite of himself. "But yeah you're a cop. If you were looking for a whore...it's either so you can be a sadistic and kinky motherfucker, or you wanna be the white collar hero."

"And how would you know which one to use on me?"

"It's them eyes."

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by "No Light No Light" by Florence and the Machine, and thanks to my girlfriend for some crazy good dialogue.
> 
> If you haven't seen it, y'all should watch "Dark Harbor" with Norman Reedus.


End file.
